What you didn't know about training supplements

Here's what you need to know...

1. For better body composition, recovery, performance and muscle growth, when you consume nutrients is just as important as what nutrients you consume.
2. The traditional rice and chicken bodybuilding meal two hours before a training session results in reduced insulin levels when you need insulin the most: at training time.
3. With proper training nutrition, insulin will shuttle amino acids and glucose directly into your muscle cells when your body has the highest insulin sensitivity
4. Proper training nutrition prevents the production of catabolic hormones that occurs during intense training sessions.

Advanced nutrition

There have been great advances in muscle building nutrition and supplementation over the years, but the one thing that trumps all others in terms of effectiveness is our knowledge of the importance of timing.

When you consume certain nutrients is just as important as what nutrients you consume when it comes to things like muscle mass, body composition, performance and strength.

We've been talking about this for years: To get the biggest gains from your workouts, you need to consume the precise compounds to fuel your muscles, recharge your muscles, and rebuild muscle. This is best done right before, during and right after your workout.

There is a tremendous amount of research on exercise nutrition and you can find articles and books that cover this concept. However, few have really explained what happens when you consume a certain combination of nutrients before, during and after exercise.

If they had, then more people would probably have understood it and there would be a whole new era of training with weights where people would actually make significant and continuous progress.

If you haven't used supplementation before, then you will want to use it after reading this article - always assuming you think logically.

If you don't understand training supplementation

Here's what's happening...

In times past, old school strength athletes ate a meal high in protein and carbohydrates about an hour or two before training. They sat back and digested while their bodies went to work breaking down the food so it could be absorbed in the intestines. There, the nutrients enter the capillaries that feed the blood vessels.

The newly digested nutrients are then piggybacked by the hormone insulin, whose levels always rise when food is consumed. Together they ride the tides until they reach other capillaries that lead directly to the muscle cells. There, the insulin will present the different amino acids and glucose to the muscle cells. The exerciser, now fortified by food, will then go to the gym and begin his training session.

During training

Unfortunately, insulin levels that were elevated after the last pre-workout meal an hour or two ago will have dropped back to baseline by this time. As a result, the levels of glycogen and glucose, which the muscles rely on during exercise, will begin to drop rapidly during the first few sets. Then the hormone glucagon starts to rear its opportunistic head. This hormone is an insulin antagonist, which means that in some ways it works against insulin. It begins to rob the muscles of amino acids so that it can convert them into the glucose that the muscles need as an energy source.

At the same time, levels of other catabolic hormones such as epinephrine and cortisol begin to rise. Epinephrine has begun to rob the liver of glycogen in its search for glucose. Cortisol begins to steal energy. But cortisol does not discriminate. It takes energy wherever it can find it: Fat, carbohydrates or the building blocks of muscle: Protein. The harder the training session, the more protein is broken down to provide energy. And this loss of protein is in addition to the damage caused by training in the form of micro-trauma and raging free radicals. Although levels of anabolic hormones such as testosterone, growth hormone and IGF-1 rise during exercise, any increases are relatively small and short-lived. These levels often drop to below baseline levels after the training session ends. Sure, they'll make some repairs in the hours in between, but the training phase itself is prime time when it comes to muscle growth.

Too bad insulin, often referred to as the most anabolic hormone, is now in short supply in our hypothetical scenario. Insulin is exactly what would negate the collective efforts of all those exercise-induced catabolic hormones. But unfortunately, by the time our exerciser arrives at the gym, insulin levels have already dropped back to baseline or below. Even if insulin levels had still been high at the start of his training session, they wouldn't have had much to carry, as our exerciser had eaten his last bite of protein an hour or two before the start of his training session! Muscle cells are most sensitive to insulin during and after exercise. As a result, very few nutrients - if any - would be stored as fat during the training phase. But this increased insulin sensitivity begins to drop as the minutes after exercise pass.

After the workout

By the time our exerciser gets his exhausted butt home an hour later and mixes himself a protein shake, his muscles are already nearly numb and blind to any increase in insulin levels from the shake he drinks. As a result, insulin can bring amino acids and glycogen to the gates of the muscle cells, but they won't hear it and won't open.

Homeless and without a place to stay, many of these glucose molecules are stored as glycogen or fat. And while it's doubtful that protein will be stored as fat, much of it will end up in the liver, which is a kind of purgatory for unused amino acids. Metabolically speaking, our exerciser's body has gone through hell, but it hasn't come back. Glycogen levels remain low, catabolic hormone levels remain elevated and the rate of protein breakdown exceeds the rate of protein synthesis. The net effect of this ostensibly conscientious training session is likely to be little or no anabolic stimulus, little or no resulting muscle growth, and possibly even some fat storage from the post-workout meal. Muscle strength might still increase, but strength is often in large part a response to a neural stimulus. But if hypertrophy and better body composition are the goal, then our exerciser is not very lucky. Let's compare the above to what would happen if our exerciser knew anything about modern, scientifically supported exercise supplementation.

When you understand training supplementation

Here's what happens...

The exerciser consumes nutrients about 45 to 60 minutes before exercise, but these consist of 40 to 50 grams of easily digestible, functional carbohydrates and about 35 to 40 grams of di- and tripeptides that go directly into the bloodstream to kick-start his metabolic machinery.

Insulin levels rise and amino acids and glucose are transported to the muscle cells in preparation for the pump. 15 minutes before the workout, the exerciser consumes another 35 to 40 grams of a special functional carbohydrate mixture and another 15 to 20 grams of fast-acting protein. This ensures that the body's most anabolic hormone, insulin, is circulating in sufficient quantities and that there are enough glucose molecules and amino acids for insulin to transport to the hard-working muscles.

If the exerciser wants to further enhance the anabolic effects of insulin, they can also take cyanine 3-glucoside at this time. This increases insulin sensitivity in muscle cells (rather than fat cells), increasing the transport of glucose and protein so that all the good stuff you get from insulin is further amplified, which will be reflected in a stronger pump, faster strength gains, increased work capacity and improved recovery.

During training

During the workout, the exerciser continues to drink his mixture of functional carbohydrates and fast-acting protein in sips. Thus, even during the part of the workout that would normally be the most metabolically devastating, both his insulin levels and insulin sensitivity are high. His blood flow is up, his pump is breathtaking and more insulin molecules are loaded like Santa's sleigh with amino acids and glucose, which are greedily taken up by the muscle cells.

With all the insulin coursing through the body, cortisol levels remain low and the glycogen and amino acid depleting effects of this hormone are negligible. Similarly, free radical production remains below a manageable minimum. Protein breakdown is extremely low. Carbohydrates, which continue to be consumed regularly, supply the ATP/creatine phosphate system with energy and ensure higher repetition rates and more intense muscle contractions. Fat is burned at a much higher rate than would otherwise be possible and this fat oxidation continues even after the training session.

After the workout

The still pumped up exerciser goes home - even though he probably feels like he could have kept exercising until the gym closed its doors - and mixes himself another small protein drink of rapidly absorbable di- and tripeptides.

His muscles are extremely sensitive to the still high insulin levels and the di- and tripeptides he has just consumed are quickly channeled into the still greedy muscle cells. Cortisol levels, which are normally elevated after a training session, are bludgeoned and shamed.

The net result of this approach: an exerciser who has given his muscles every advantage.

1. The anabolic environment he has created is perfect for muscle growth and recovery.
2. Protein synthesis is at an elevated level.
3. The levels of catabolic hormones are low.
4. Fat oxidation takes place like in a blast furnace.
5. Free radicals are minimized.
6. ATP and creatine levels are fully restored.

If you weighed his muscles, they would be much heavier in percentage terms than if he followed the traditional approach.
This exerciser has done everything he can to shuffle the muscle-building cards in his favor and he will be rewarded with significant additional muscle growth and improved body composition. What's more, they are unlikely to feel sore or exhausted the next day, allowing them to train just as hard as the day before.

This is a marked difference from the traditional approach used by the first trainee.
There are few things in weight training that are as uncontroversial as proper training supplementation. This is based on perfect logic and perfect science. What you do the rest of the day is up to you, but give your training supplementation the attention it deserves and you will make the progress that has eluded you in the past.

By TC Luoma |
Source: https://www.t-nation.com/supplements/what-you-dont-know-about-workout-supplementation